Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Tuner-Technicians Forum New Engineering concepts on Piano Sound production

Wouldn't be at all surprised to see the first examples being "test driven" at the Hard Rock Cafes Phil

Looking forward to hearing and seeing it in person!

Edit: I didn't read the rest of the thread before posting. I have to say I find the tone taken towards skeptics to be... unfortunate, and more than a bit disappointing.

I'm sure the violinists will be fighting to the front of the line to try their bows out on a 60 lb violin.

Robert, the idea is interesting enough for me to want to hear a piano with the granite bridge, if I come across one. As others here and elswhere have found with unique tunings (eg.), recorded samples don't often offer full justice for the listener to hear subtle and/or unique differences.

If it doesn't catch on in a big way, don't be alarmed...you can always find a market in California...just tell them no condors were used in the testing of it, the granite is fully organic, pesticide free... and throw in a bio feedback system with a free tie dyed toga and you'll be set.

Don't the strings break when you tune more than a m3 up?

Kees

And has that statement been approved by the Food and Drug Administration?

A very interesting treble quality that is in direct contradiction to the 'woody' sound (feel) that Steinway claims is preferred by their surveyed pianist.

We are looking forward to your reading your reactions to the piano. How different does it sound from the YouTube videos mentioned earlier in this thread?

Do you mean definitely?

[irony on]
Quickly popping in from the garden, where I had some great fun making mudcakes with Johnkie.
[irony off]

Just for the record:

I am absolutely fascinated by the concept of alternative materials for piano components, and how they influence touch and tone. I am even more interested in a scientific exploration of these things. After all, this thread was titled "new engineering concepts on piano sound production". I was immediately drawn to it.

But chakras, healing frequencies, cellular experiences and the likes have nothing to do with scientific and engineering concepts. So I called them out! That's not rhetoric, it's making a much-needed distinction between science and non-science. I might not be a trained piano technician, but I'm a trained scientist.

Robert, if you claim to be talking in scientific and engineering terms, but post all sorts of non-science, then you must be prepared to be called out! Amongst scientists, such robust discussion is absolutely normal, because we are passionate about cutting through the chase and getting to the real science.

Back to the garden...

Yea, I noticed that too, and was puzzled until I recalled some butchering my spell-checker has suggested in the past. Still ... there has been a little on the order of defiance in the OPs posts, so the mistake may have some tangential merit.

What I found curious was the lack of pictures of the stone bridge.

The playability ... locates more there in the beginning of the tone, for a piano anyway.

How the pianists plays with the attack quality is big part of the nuances. A long sustain is indeed a plus, but the name that strikes me in piano tone is articulation.

Granite weighs a lot too but, as John mentioned which was one of my first thoughts, all we see are two pictures of pianos but no pictures of granite bridges...

Kamin, are the two plots from the pianos in Robert Clair de Lune YouTube movie?

no sorry those are only one note, but we see the 2 canals of the stereo, I should have said what is it...

one need an isolated note (without sustain pedal) to plot it, not easy in a musical record

Most likely because it isn't patent(pending) protected, or the masonry tool kits for the techs have not been compiled yet.

Even so, I suspect some pseudo engineer with a last name similar to the sound a dropped fork makes already has visions of the new and improved Mark 2 Glanite Bridge system in the works.

Yes, of course. Your two plots make the point very well. BDB said something similar. Sound's like the ring of hammer and chisel to me!

>You tube really isn't the proper place to have a true judgement and has no comparison rather than in person but for now this is all we have at the moment.

Robert,

Maybe, then your announcement and posting of the videos was a bit premature. These videos may pop up for the coming years if you search on your technology, and thus people may reject the actual sound of your invention based on these videos for years to come.

I recommend getting a really good audio engineer that uses dead flat response mics with the piano in a good acoustic environment. And reports very careful which mics and which environment was used so that people can put the recording in the right perspective.

Without a good recording, I guess you're not going to convince people even to come to hear the real thing.

My guess is that the original poster has a real product, but the lack of pictures of the granite bridge, bits of new-age pseudo-science, and the ease with which sound files can be modified has produced some very legitimate questioning and the slight hint of a spoof.

It is real. I first saw this piano a few weeks ago, and again last night at the Chicago PTG meeting. In terms of what it sounds like, one could describe it as Phoenix bridge agraffes on steroids. The sustain is long, and the tone is clear. In my opinion, it improved the sound of the piano.

That being said, I have concerns:

Serviceability: the bridge pins are epoxied into the granite, so how does one replace the bridge pins when they inevitably deteriorate?

Workmanship quality: I thought the bridge pinning looked sloppy, partly due to the fact that the bridge pins are inserted vertically and then bent. Additionally, the added dampers looked sloppily done. These are things that would need improvement before they're put in a high-end piano. The bridge notching looked good, though.

Practicality: I don't see how the work required to do this is worth the effort (more on this later).

Longevity: Others at the meeting expressed concerns about how the granite and soundboard will interact as the soundboard changes over time.


As I see it, there are two reasons why the bridge changes the sound of the piano: it's a more efficient termination than wood is, and it has a lot more mass than wood.

As many on here know, there are some small-scale rebuilders/builders of pianos who use hardened termination points and/or ebony capped bridges. This makes the piano sound more clear.

There is also the mass issue. Granite has a lot more mass than wood. By using granite as a bridge, they are essentially mass-loading the soundboard, which raises its mechanical impedance, slows the transfer of energy from strings to soundboard, and thus lengthens sustain. The bass bridge, unlike the treble, is not solid granite; it is a wood bridge with a granite cap. Why? A full granite bass bridge would raise the impedance too much in that area of the soundboard and kill the tone. This is why some incorporate floating bridges or thin the board in the bass area.

With this in mind, I'm confident that one could produce the same effects with a traditional bridge (without all the fuss of granite) by mass loading the soundboard with brass weights or using auxiliary riblets, and using more efficient terminations (i.e. bridge agraffes, etc.). There is nothing magical about granite.

Mr. Di Santo is obviously ESL, hence the difficulty in communicating.

Yeah, no photos because someone might steal his revolutionary idea. Please...

Crummy-quality YouTube recordings, poorly set up, using Story & Clarks as test beds, citing mysticism for science, and then the insulting and petulance. yeah, this guy's going far...